Welcome to The Open Door! This week (December 1) we discuss the direction of the Catholic Church, especially in the United States, and the currents of thought—and action—that shape that direction. Our welcome guest is Larry S. Chapp. He taught theology for two decades at De Sales University. Currently he owns and manages, with his wife Carrie, the Dorothy Day Catholic Worker Farm in Harveys Lake, Pennsylvania. He is the author of Scientific Naturalism and its Challenge to the Christian Faith (T & T Clark, 2011). Among the questions we’ll ask are the following. Please feel free to suggest your own!

You’ve just recovered from COVID. Could you tell us about the experience and the lessons that it brings?

From university professor to managing a farm? Why and how did this come about?

Dorothy Day was a student of Catholic intellectuals like Jacques Maritain and Emmanuel Mounier. Who are the mentors of today’s Catholic Worker movement?

How does Vatican Council II continue to shape American Catholicism?

You underscore the pivotal importance of Gaudium et spes, n. 22. “The truth is that only in the mystery of the Incarnate Word does the mystery of man take on light.” Why is this so?

Now comes a tall order! You distinguished, following D.C. Schindler, four responses to political modernity: Whig Thomism, a modus vivendi prudentialism, integralism, and the prophetic/eschatological stance. Could you navigate us through these positions?

Quo vadis? You’ve written that this question is the most pressing one we face today. St. Junipero Serra’s reply is Siempre adelante, con juicio. Do any particular examples or applications come to mind?